Method and apparatus for fully automated segmentation of joint using patient-specific optimal thresholding and watershed algorithm

A method of fully automatically segmenting an image, the method comprising steps of:

• extracting region information corresponding to a target object to be segmented from a medical image of the target object by associating a thresholding method and a load path algorithm, wherein the medical image indicates a quantitative computed tomography (QCT), computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), wherein the target object includes one or more bones, and wherein the step of extracting the region information corresponding to the target object comprises steps of:
• performing thresholding on the medical image based on a predetermined threshold;
• extracting a flag array related to the target object from an image on which the thresholding has been performed based on the load path algorithm;
• and
• generating a regional patch corresponding to the target object based on the extracted flag array;
• generating a first mask based on the extracted region information;
• generating a morphological patch by performing morphological subdivision on the medical image based on a watershed algorithm;
• generating a second mask based on the generated morphological patch;
• and
• segmenting an image corresponding to the target object from the medical image based on the first mask and the second mask.

A method of fully automatically segmenting an image, the method comprising steps of:

• extracting region information corresponding to a target object to be segmented from a medical image of the target object by associating a thresholding method and a load path algorithm, wherein the medical image indicates a quantitative computed tomography (QCT), computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and wherein the target object includes one or more bones;
• generating a first mask based on the extracted region information;
• generating a morphological patch by performing morphological subdivision on the medical image based on a watershed algorithm, wherein the step of generating the morphological patch comprises steps of:
• removing noise from the medical image based on a middle value filter;
• reinforcing a boundary of the image corresponding to the target object by performing dilation operation and erosion operation on an image from which the noise has been removed;
• and
• performing morphological subdivision on the image whose boundary has been enhanced based on the watershed algorithm;
• generating a second mask based on the generated morphological patch;
• and
• segmenting an image corresponding to the target object from the medical image based on the first mask and the second mask.